Home Built With "Green Power" Debuts in River Counties on mississippi river journal

Just because you want a house that echoes historic design approaches doesn’t mean that you must give up having a house that is green and sustainable. Our architect has just designed a prairie style green house for us in Clinton KY. The building is now completed and we have settled in.

The three concepts that drove our decision were that over the next 20 to 30 years my wife and I will not get any younger, energy prices are not likely to go down and of course since we have not won the lottery lately, the budget is limited. A dream home is not built for just the next four years and resale as so many tract homes are. We looked at what we will need in a house for the next 30 plus years. With that timeline, handicap accessibility must be designed into the home to avoid retrofit costs when we are retired and inflation has drastically increased costs. As we all have witnessed, the transition from carbon based energy sources to any other is going to be painful and expensive. We decided to invest once in the structure of our home instead of monthly in the utility company for the next 30 plus years. Investing in the structure meant making building and design choices that would reduce energy usage (cost). Since we live in the New Madrid seismic zone, we made certain that the house was designed with that in mind. We selected green building techniques that reduced many of our construction costs, which fit our dream home into our budget.

Siting a home on a lot has not been an issue since World War II. The rule has been: Build the house to face the road, Maximize curb appeal and Maximize resale value. This comes with the assumption that energy is cheap and that heating and air conditioning can overcome any natural deficiencies to the siting of the structure. Our building concepts required that we site the home on the lot to take advantage of all free natural energy sources and to reduce energy loss. Siting our house 15 degrees off of due south, with all but three windows on the south side of the house, maximizes passive solar gain to assist in heating the house in winter. Only one window faces north, which minimizes heat loss on the coldest side of the house in winter. With all those south facing windows, eaves were designed to shade them so no summer sun would directly penetrate the house, eliminating overheating in summer.

To take full advantage of the free natural energy from the earth and the sun, the house has a cement slab floor which acts as a heat sink, absorbing heat from the sun in the winter, releasing it at night to heat the house. In the summer, with no summer sun, the concrete slab has a cooling effect on the house since the 55-degree earth cools it. To maximize the absorption and release effect of this cement heat sink, it is exposed in the main room. The floor is stained concrete.

Building green, to us, also meant anticipating natural events. The house was designed to meet the state code requirements for a 90-mile an hour wind and also a Zone E earthquake, since it is in the New Madrid fault zone. A registered structural engineer analyzed the house plans to ensure the design met these goals.

The structural choices for a home have changed significantly: stick frame, post and beam, Structural Insulated Panel (SIP), rammed earth, straw bale, cement, etc. We chose polyurethane SIP’s because these SIP’s offered: very high resistance to heat transfer (R-24 wall in a 4” wall, R-40 in a 6” roof), a stronger wall, an aged R-value the same as when built, and an almost airtight structure. Once energy is captured, a green home will keep it inside not vent it to the outside. Other green attributes included SIP panels manufactured within 500 miles of our site. Because SIP’s are built in a factory setting waste material is minimized while maximizing recycling of waste materials. On the cost side, labor costs were reduced significantly by constructing panels in a factory setting with only 5 days devoted to installation on site. Structural members and window and door openings were built into the panels, as were wire chases and electrical boxes. Since the SIP manufacturer, Thermocore®, sent an experienced team of five to install the SIP’s, there was no learning curve for local contractors. It took only 35 work hours for the team to install all structural walls and roof on our 3,000 sq. ft. home.

Windows are the weakest thermal part of the shell of a home so we invested in the best we could find. We chose the highest rated windows from Andersen Windows. U-value here is critical. The lowest U-value, meaning transfer of heat and cold in or out of the building, is the best, with a target of under 0.35.

Plan to minimize energy use in the home by design, select Energy Star products at a minimum, and plan on reducing phantom loads. We also planned for a potential secondary power source such as active solar panels to eliminate the need to replace the main panel later.

Reduction of heat gain at the roof was achieved by use of a light colored roof material that reflects the summer sun instead of absorbing it. Absorbing the sun’s heat warms the interior of the building, as you recognize when you get into your car in the summer.

We continued to reduce materials use (and cost of construction), a green strategy, when we chose thin panel bricks for the exterior surface of the home. Thin panel bricks are one half inch thick standard fired brick material attached to a 16”x48” panel. This panel is then screwed onto the house frame and brick mortar is extruded between the bricks. The result, a brick home with real bricks and mortar, yet 82% less material. This manufacturer, Thin Brick Co. of Owensboro, was also less than 250 miles away. The installed price was $6,000 less than the lowest full size brick quote and construction was much faster.

When making decisions regarding interior finishes, there are more options and they can all be green. However, you may have to move beyond your local big box retailer to find the quality and price you want. We chose strand bamboo hardwood flooring because it is very strong, dense and does not give off volatile organic compounds (VOC), which are health hazards. This selection was made after comparing about 20 samples of various hardwoods from a variety of manufacturers. The first selection criterion was withstanding my hammer drop test. Yes, I dropped a hammer onto each sample piece to see how it withstood the impact. Most failed the test. Only five-year-old strand bamboo and Brazilian cherry withstood the hammer drop without visual trauma. We liked how both looked, but chose the bamboo because it is renewable and was cheaper.

In the kitchen, we reduced costs by using stained maple instead of cherry wood. We also reduced countertop cost by reducing raw material, using a 2 cm Murano granite system instead of the larger, costlier 3 cm granite. This 33% reduction in material and simpler installation resulted in an installed price of $3,000 for material and labor. Once again, we chose the greener option, saving big.

Handicap accessibility was designed into the structure: roll-over door thresholds, over-sized doors, elimination of hallways, roll-in showers, bathrooms with a five foot turning radius and a four foot kitchen access, as well as use of cabinet drawers instead of shelving and levers instead of knobs throughout the building. This investment pays off immediately in ease of use for people of all ages.

After reducing demand for heating and cooling through use of high R-value/low U-value materials and methods of construction, we selected a geothermal heating and air conditioning system. While this does cost more to purchase and install, the efficiency of the unit recoups that extra cost quickly. A geothermal unit is similar to a very efficient heat pump but with a source that is always 55 degrees, not whatever the outside air temperature happens to be. An additional benefit is that the waste heat from the geothermal unit is used as auxiliary heat for the hot water heater, vastly increasing the water heater’s efficiency.

Another big way to reduce costs has been termed sweat equity. This requires that you know your own skills. The more quality work you can do, the more money you can save. There is one caveat. If it can kill you or damage the home if not done correctly, leave it to the pros. We chose to do the interior painting and trim work. However, the contractor installed all of the doors and windows.

An important issue in building construction is waste management. Materials should be sorted. Those that can be used on the job - cut-offs from lumber and so on - should be placed in an appropriate place protected from weather until used. Materials that can be recycled should be sorted and placed in an appropriate location until taken to the recycling center. Materials that cannot be re-used in any way should be placed in a dumpster for pickup.

We found our “green” architect by searching the state website for state certified “green” architects. State certification is a good start, but check references. If possible, visit some homes the architect has designed and built. Ensure that you are comfortable communicating and exchanging ideas without taking offense, because if selected you and your architect will spend a lot of time together working through problems. One last recommendation that worked well for us; since this is our first home to build, I required that the architect inspect and certify all work for a bill complete before I paid the bill. This ensured that a qualified experienced person without a conflict of interest would verify the home was built to standard code requirements and to achieve the vision of the design.

As with most projects, the more effort you put into the project the greater the likelihood of success. Realize also, that this field, green building, is evolving so fast that no one has all the answers. Do your own research. Find out what LEED certification is, and do you want to achieve it wholly or in part? Check out industry organizations (www.sips.org for example) not just individual companies or products. What rebates or tax incentives are available through your utility company and all taxing entities? Determine what goals are important to you and make sure through your research and working with your architect and general contractor that your home accomplishes these goals. Understand, I am no expert, just a man who built a green home. You can check out our home on the web at: www.homes-across-america.org in the Kentucky section, “Buss residence”. I wish you the best on your project.